Boca Raton or St. Pete Beach?

These are two very good but quite different beaches. Boca Raton has a series of public beach parks on the Atlantic, with soft pale sand, dunes and sea grape. At Red Reef Park a rocky reef starts close enough to snorkel from the shore, and the water is warm enough to swim in every month.

St. Pete Beach is one continuous strip of fine quartz sand on calm, shallow Gulf water that faces west into the sunset, with wilder sand at Fort De Soto and Shell Key nearby. It has the edge for a long lazy beach day, but its water turns cool in winter, and red tide occasionally spoils it for a while.

Neither town is a reason to travel for food, and they fall short in different ways. Boca Raton eats indoors and dresses up: steakhouses and Italian dining rooms around Mizner Park, plus a strong tradition of Jewish delis and bagel bakeries.

St. Pete Beach eats outdoors in flip-flops, with grouper sandwiches, smoked fish spread and fried shrimp at seafood shacks, and dinner on a deck at sunset. For more range you drive to Delray Beach from one and to St. Petersburg from the other.

Boca Raton has more to see, though not a great deal. Addison Mizner's stucco and barrel-tile town still shapes downtown, the Old Town Hall holds the history museum, there is a respectable art museum, and the Morikami Museum and Japanese Gardens just north is a genuinely memorable visit.

St. Pete Beach has the pink Don CeSar hotel, Pass-a-Grille's old cottages and the war batteries at Fort De Soto. That is about it until you cross the bay to St. Petersburg's museums.

Both towns are quiet after dark, but they spend the evening differently. Boca Raton's night is dinner followed by a glass at a wine bar or cocktail lounge around Mizner Park, plus a few student bars near the university. Delray Beach's Atlantic Avenue, fifteen minutes north, is the place for something louder.

On St. Pete Beach the evening peaks at sunset, on tiki decks with a cover band, and winds down soon after. For a later night you go to downtown St. Petersburg, half an hour away.

St. Pete Beach is the better choice for wildlife on the water. You can paddle through mangrove trails at Fort De Soto and Shell Key, dolphins are easy to see from boats, manatees come into the bay in the cooler months, and roseate spoonbills feed on the flats.

Boca Raton's outdoors is more scattered but has its own strengths. Divers have the nearshore reef, sailfish charters run out into the Gulf Stream, Gumbo Limbo offers sea turtle walks in nesting season, and there are alligators at the Loxahatchee refuge half an hour inland.

Both are well placed for trips out, in different ways. Boca Raton sits between Palm Beach, Fort Lauderdale and Miami, and trains reach all three, so Art Deco South Beach or the Flagler mansion make easy days out. The catch is that it is all the same coastal strip in different moods.

St. Pete Beach offers more variety but needs the car. Choose from the Dalí Museum in St. Petersburg, Tampa's cigar-factory streets in Ybor City, the Greek sponge docks at Tarpon Springs, Sarasota's Ringling estate, or Orlando's theme parks if you are willing to spend a long day driving.

Boca Raton is easy with children in the way a well-run suburb is: lifeguarded beach parks with shade and picnic tables, a gentle first snorkel at Red Reef Park, and the turtle tanks at Gumbo Limbo, the Children's Science Explorium and the playgrounds of Sugar Sand Park for days off the sand. The catch is that every outing means a drive along wide roads, and the bigger days out, such as Lion Country Safari or Miami's zoo, take an hour or more each way.

St. Pete Beach comes out ahead because the whole vacation stays in one place. The beach is the main event of the day, a trolley runs the length of the strip, and the old fort and fishing pier at Fort De Soto make an easy half-day for older children. For a bigger treat, Busch Gardens is about an hour away and Orlando's theme parks can be done as one long day out, though in summer, in either town, the day is best planned around the cooler morning hours.

You will want a car in both, but St. Pete Beach is simpler day to day. It is one narrow strip with a beach trolley along its length, and Pass-a-Grille and Corey Avenue are easy to walk or cycle.

Boca Raton spreads along wide multi-lane roads, its buses are slow, and only the downtown around Mizner Park is pleasant on foot. Its trump card is the train: Tri-Rail and Brightline make car-free days in Miami or Fort Lauderdale realistic, which St. Pete Beach has no equivalent for.

This is where the two differ most. Shopping is a local pastime in Boca Raton, with an enclosed mall full of department stores and designer labels and the palm-lined boutique streets of Mizner Park and Royal Palm Place. It is polished rather than characterful.

St. Pete Beach sells swimwear, beach gear and souvenirs along Gulf Boulevard, with a few galleries on Corey Avenue and in Pass-a-Grille. Anything more means a drive to St. Petersburg or Tampa.

Neither is cheap, but Boca Raton costs more. It is one of the wealthiest towns on the coast, winter hotel rates match those of major international cities, restaurants are priced for well-off locals, and even the beach parks charge for parking.

St. Pete Beach's resorts are expensive too, especially in late winter and spring. Older motels a block back from the sand and casual seafood places make a cheaper stay possible. In both, summer is the time to save.

Boca Raton has a real if modest winter season of its own. There are open-air concerts and the Festival of the Arts at the Mizner Park Amphitheater, Broadway-style musicals from a regional theatre, conservatory recitals at Lynn University and a local ballet company, with the Kravis Center a short drive north.

St. Pete Beach offers cover bands and acoustic sets at beach bars. For an orchestra or a touring musical you go to St. Petersburg or Tampa.

Rest works much the same in both: resort spas, day spas and massage, but no bathing tradition. What differs is the mood. Boca Raton's calm is manicured and suburban, with yoga studios, pool days and early nights. St. Pete Beach's is the slow pace of a beach town, with a morning walk on the sand and everyone stopping for sunset, at its easiest in Pass-a-Grille and outside the spring-break weeks.